Is this a writing/drawing challenge for Sapphic September 2024, because I didn't see any, and my brain just waterfalled this all over a page?
It can be if you would like it to be.
No pressure, like, at all.
But if you do, maybe tag your works with Sapphtember so people can discover them?
Cohost Sapphic September 2024 writing prompt: 23 — Girls who are mechanical
"Hello?" A portly, bespectacled woman dressed in snow-dusted furs and stout travelling boots wanders the entrance-hall of Coilthraum Indeliblis, peering anxiously down darkened hallways. "...Hello? It's me — I mean, we spoke by far-mirror, in the spring; it's Hamartia peri-Dociocus? The antiquarian? You wanted — you wanted an appraisal of some items of uncertain provenance? Hello?"
She had passed through three great sets of doors, from the outside of the mountain and through the imposing corridor to this place, silently opening themselves for her and closing after her; a good portion of some lesser kings' palaces could be built within this single chamber. It is dizzyingly high-ceilinged, clean and sharp and precise-angled, magically lit in a faintly honey-coloured hue. The floor is divided into three — a central lane, straight from entrance to a corridor leading further in, flanked by two expanses of empty floor against the sides of the hall; set apart from one another by two long, shallow, raked beds of ancient coins, all struck from gold, almost like the sand-beds of a meditation-garden.
Statues — stylised women — lie in languid poses, dotted along the length of the coinage-garden, no two quite alike, black and gold and glowing ember-colours.
"Hello?" the antiquarian calls again, sounding increasingly nervous.
Behind her, there's a clink. She turns hastily; nothing. Nobody. She lets out a high, unnerved laugh.
Behind her again, in the opposite direction, a clink. She whirls; scans the empty chamber.
A provocative, unblinking statue-gaze bores into her, from a figure draped over the coins on its sculpted back. She wipes shaky, sweaty hands on her clothes, mutters to herself about imagining, about thinking things had moved and trick of the mind—
clink
She holds herself still, this time, before allowing herself to turn in a controlled way. One of the statue-women has undoubtedly moved, now, drawn itself up on its elbow, chin propped on a girlish hand.
Hamartia looks around, lets herself look at all of the figures; and sees that now, every one of them is looking directly at her.
"I'm an invited guest," she says, in a wobbly voice. "The dragon—"
"The Glasswitch tried to poison Miss," the nearest statue-woman says, in a slow, desultory, contemptuous way. "Miss is currently roosting on the polished metal-leaf minarets of the Glasswitch's favourite city, where she studied under She Who Cuts The Spiral Inward, and vomiting corrosive bile on them to spite her. Miss will remember you, with a settled stomach."
"The dragon asked me to appraise some items," Hamartia says faintly, and the statue-women crawl from their poses in perfect unison, disturbing not a single coin between them, a sinuous mechanical tide of limb and predatory smile.
"We'll take care of you," they say, all together and eyes glittering.
